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STRINGS(1) FreeBSD General Commands Manual STRINGS(1)
NAMEstrings -- print the strings of printable characters in files
SYNOPSISstrings [-a | --all] [-eencoding | --encoding=encoding]
[-f | --print-file-name] [-h | --help]
[-nnumber | --bytes=number | -number] [-o]
[-tradix | --radix=radix] [-v | --version] [file...]
DESCRIPTION
For each file specified, the strings utility prints contiguous sequences
of printable characters that are at least n characters long and are fol-
lowed by an unprintable character. The default value of n is 4. By
default, the strings utility only scans the initialized and loaded sec-
tions of ELF objects; for other file types, the entire file is scanned.
The strings utility is mainly used for determining the contents of non-
text files.
If no file name is specified as an argument, standard input is read.
The following options are available:
-a | --all
For ELF objects, scan the entire file for printable strings.
-eencoding | --encoding=encoding
Select the character encoding to be used while searching for
strings. Valid values for argument encoding are:
s for single 7-bit-byte characters (ASCII, ISO 8859).
S for single 8-bit-byte characters.
l for 16-bit little-endian.
b for 16-bit big-endian.
L for 32-bit little-endian.
B for 32-bit big-endian.
The default is to assume that characters are encoded using a sin-
gle 7-bit byte.
-f | --print-file-name
Print the name of the file before each string.
-h | --help
Print a usage summary and exit.
-nnumber | --bytes=number | -number
Print the contiguous character sequence of at least number char-
acters long, instead of the default of 4 characters. Argument
number should specify a positive decimal integer.
-o Equivalent to specifying -to.
-tradix | --radix=radix
Print the offset from the start of the file before each string
using the specified radix. Valid values for argument radix are:
d for decimal
o for octal
x for hexadecimal
-v | --version
Display a version identifier and exit.
EXIT STATUS
The strings utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.
EXAMPLES
To display strings in /bin/ls use:
$ strings /bin/ls
To display strings in all sections of /bin/ln use:
$ strings -a /bin/ln
To display strings in all sections of /bin/cat prefixed with the filename
and the offset within the file use:
$ strings -a -f -t x /bin/cat
SEE ALSOar(1), nm(1), objdump(1), ranlib, readelf(1), size(1)HISTORY
The first FreeBSD strings utility appeared in FreeBSD v3. It was later
discontinued in FreeBSD v5, when i386-only a.out format was dropped in
favor of ELF.
AUTHORS
The strings utility was re-written by S.Sam Arun Raj
<samarunraj@gmail.com>. This manual page was written by S.Sam Arun Raj
<samarunraj@gmail.com>.
FreeBSD Ports 11.2 January 24, 2016 FreeBSD Ports 11.2